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The development of high-speed strobe-flash photography in the 1960s by the late MIT professor Harold "Doc" Edgerton allowed us to visualize events too fast for the eye — a bullet piercing an apple, or a droplet hitting a pool of milk.

Students and recent graduates in the College of Natural Sciences were awarded the George H. Mitchell Award for Academic Excellence this spring. These awards honor students in STEM and other categories, with generous support provided by the University Co-op. The University of Texas at Austin recognized 12 undergraduate students this year for superior scholarly and creative achievements, highlighting the unparalleled dedication and achievement the students showed in their fields of study. 

Each year, the College of Natural Sciences bestows its highest honors for graduating seniors on a select group of students during graduation week. Students across the college are singled out for College of Natural Sciences Distinctions and celebrated at a special Graduates of Distinction event. Among the distinction winners is an even smaller group of students, known as Dean's Honored Graduates. 

​The National Science Foundation (NSF) awards a Graduate Research Fellowship to students who plan on pursuing a research-based master's or Ph.D. program in a STEM-related field. The fellowship is awarded to exceptional individuals and will support them in elevating their research with the goal of furthering advancements that will transform the future.

Three undergraduate students from the College of Natural Sciences have been awarded the 2022 Barry Goldwater Scholarship, a prestigious national scholarship given to students pursuing careers in the natural sciences, mathematics and engineering fields. Olivia Conway, Aniket Sanghi, and Kevin Zhou are among 475 college students from across the country to receive the scholarship for the 2022 competition.

Experts have taken a step towards the use of special materials called phononic crystals in cell phones and other mobile devices, an advance that is important to make more devices compatible with emerging 5G communications and other new technologies.

Here in part 2 of our continuing remembrance of Steven Weinberg, we're diving a little deeper into what we know because of him. Weinberg was one of the world's greatest theoretical physicists, and his passing last year was deeply felt not only by us here at The University of Texas at Austin, but by a broad community of scientists and science-loving people. Weinberg summed up the goal of his life's work as: "to know why things are the way they are." To him, that meant distilling the rules of physics down to their simplest, most beautiful essence.

Today, in the first of two parts of a special segment, we're remembering the life and legacy of one of the greatest theoretical physicists of all time — The University of Texas at Austin's Steven Weinberg, who died in July. We're exploring who he was as a scientist, writer and mentor — and a deep thinker about our place in the universe. We'll hear from colleagues who worked with him — fellow UT Austin physicists Katherine Freese, Willy Fischler and Can Kilic — and from his former student John Preskill.

The College of Natural Sciences is the academic home base for six tenured and tenure-track faculty new to Texas Science this spring—and one new department chair who returns to our Department of Molecular Biosciences and academic leadership on the Forty Acres. These new faculty members have expertise in a wide range of areas, from medical applications for data science and statistics to improving interactions between computers and people, including people with impaired vision. These outstanding researchers and teachers join the fall cohort for 2021-2022 as the newest members of our faculty.

While for many 2021 may have felt like it lasted a few years, it was in fact just 12 months—and University of Texas at Austin scientists and researchers managed to pack a ton of new discoveries into that time. From the furthest reaches of the cosmos to the depths of the ocean and from the tiniest microbes to the most massive black holes, research in Texas Science covered a lot of ground, as researchers pushed boundaries, answered big questions and offered solutions to the world's problems. Here are 16 examples of how UT Austin scientists, mathematicians and technologists used 2021 to usher in new knowledge and innovations to help change the world.